Malik Monk scored 35 of his 39 points after halftime and the Sacramento Kings defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves 124-120 in overtime on Friday night at Target Center in Minneapolis.

Anthony Edwards, Minnesota’s leading scorer, had 11 points in the first half but did not play after halftime due to personal reasons, according to team officials.

Minnesota led 120-117 midway through the overtime period before Monk hit back-to-back 3-pointers. The Wolves had a chance to tie it with 17.5 seconds to play, but Naz Reid missed a corner 3 and Trey Lyles hit a free throw to clinch the victory.

Sacramento’s Domantas Sabonis had 21 points, 15 rebounds and eight assists before fouling out in overtime.

Keegan Murray scored 17 points, Davion Mitchell had 16 and Harrison Barnes had 14 for the Kings, who were missing leading scorer De’Aaron Fox, who missed his second straight game with a left knee contusion.

Monk made 16 of 29 shots, including 5 of 8 3-pointers, to make up for the absence of Fox’s 26.9 points per game.

“The great teams always have two or three guys like that where, sometimes you don’t have to call a play, you just say, ‘Here’s the ball — go make a play, for yourself or for your teammates,’” Kings coach Mike Brown said. “And Malik did that. Especially with Fox out, down the stretch we needed somebody to stand up for us and Malik was the guy that did.”

Jaden McDaniels led the Timberwolves with 26 points. Karl-Anthony Towns scored 19 points, Reid had 18 points and Rudy Gobert had 16 points and 16 rebounds.

Playing against a much bigger team, the Kings turned the game with 14 offensive rebounds, which led to 20 second-chance points.

“A lot of times we did a great job defensively and then they get those rebounds, they get a kick-out 3, and that hurts,” Gobert said. “Instead of (us) getting a stop, they get a wide-open shot.”

Monk scored 11 of Sacramento’s last 13 points of the third quarter, to stretch a one-point lead into a 91–82 advantage.

“I had to get it going at some point,” Monk said of his second-half surge. “I was getting to the rim and my midrange and floater opened things up for me.”

The Wolves opened the fourth on a 14-4 run for a 96-95 lead on McDaniels’ 3-pointer. But Monk responded with a driving layup and a breakaway dunk to put the Kings back on top.

Gobert hit one of two free throws with 40.1 seconds to play to tie the score at 115-115 and send it into overtime.

For the second straight game, the Wolves dug themselves a hole early. Two nights after falling behind Memphis 14-0, Minnesota started 1 for 4 with three turnovers on its first seven possessions. Meanwhile, the Kings hit four of their first six 3-point attempts and raced to an 18-4 lead.

“Tonight, I think our slow start and the offensive rebounding were the things that sunk us,” Minnesota coach Chris Finch said.

The Wolves’ offense also stagnated at the worst possible time. After taking their three-point lead in overtime, they came up empty on six consecutive possessions.

“We were trying to put bodies on bodies all night,” Brown said. “We have to have a level of physicality in order to win games, because we’re not going to be able to score 125 points every game.”

If it’s the first Friday in March, odds are better than 50-50 over the past four decades that Hill-Murray and White Bear Lake are playing for a trip to the state boys hockey tournament.

Those numbers increase dramatically when it comes to chances of the Pioneers advancing.

But not this year.

Jack Stanius scored in the game’s opening minute, Leo Gabriel earned his eighth shutout of the season with a 35-save effort and second-seeded White Bear Lake upset top-seeded Hill-Murray 3-0 in the Class 2A, Section 4 championship game inside a sold-out Aldrich Arena.

Blake Eckerle and Nolan Roed added empty-net goals, and White Bear Lake is going to state for the 20th time, and first since 2019.

“It’s awesome. I mean no one likes those guys, nobody,” Gabriel said. “This is just great.”

State tournament action in Class 2A begins Thursday at Xcel Energy Center; Class A starts Wednesday. Brackets are scheduled to be announced Saturday morning.

Gabriel’s performance wasn’t a surprise to his teammates, who are plenty enamored with what their junior goaltender has done all season. His goals-against average dropped to 1.87 and his save percentage went up to .924.

“Every game we suit up for we know that we got a good backbone,” Stanius said.

First-year coach Chris Anderson, a longtime Bears assistant, said a key for White Bear Lake was using its big defenseman to box out and largely keep speedy Hill-Murray to the outside. “I can’t really think of one other than off the pipe where it was a Grade-A, intense situation in front of the net.”

It is the sixth time in seven years the schools have met for section crown. Hill-Murray won four of the previous five, and, dating to 1985, the Pioneers are 14-6 against White Bear Lake in section finals.

“They did what they had to do. They got a lead, and they held it,” said Hill-Murray coach Bill Lechner.

The bulk of the first period was spent in the White Bear Lake zone — Gabriel made 16 saves — yet it was a goal by Stanius off a scramble 36 seconds in that put the Bears ahead.

White Bear Lake (20-7-1) had just four shots in the period and four in the second. It finished with 16.

Stanius missed 15 games with an injury before returning Feb. 13. Since then, the junior forward has four goals in six games.

“I’m definitely hungry, but at the end of the day it’s a team game. My linemate Nolan Roed is obviously a great hockey player, I hope he wins Mr. Hockey. But, yeah, it’s good to get back and good to win this one,” he said.

Hill-Murray (17-9-2) continued to spend more time in the White Bear Lake end in period two but could not get the equalizer. The closest the Pioneers got was Chaz Lentz sliding a rebound through the crease.

“When you start hitting pipes or just miss open nets you start to get concerned, you feel like maybe this isn’t our night, but you can’t do that,” Lechner said. “I really believed we’d probably at least get it tied 1-1. We’ve had six overtime games and we’ve won five of them against good teams. … It just wasn’t meant to be tonight. Nobody’s going to have sympathy for us because we’ve been very fortunate through the years, but it’s somebody else’s turn out of Section 4.”

Hill-Murray, which scored three times in the final six minutes to beat Gentry Academy 4-2 in the semifinal, just missed tying the game midway through the third when Caden Zasada lifted a shot over Gabriel, but it clanged off the crossbar. Zasada put his hands to his helmet while bending forward in disbelief.

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Cretin-Derham Hall senior Chuck Owens and his teammates came into this season’s Class 2A, Section 3 playoffs as just the No. 5 seed.

But the Raiders ended them the same way they have the past two seasons: as champions.

Owens got his team on the board first, scoring with 9:03 to play in the second period, and added an empty-netter late as the Raiders earned their third straight section crown with a 3-1 win over St. Thomas Academy in Friday night’s championship game at a sold-out Braemar Arena in Edina.

“The feeling couldn’t get any better every single time,” said Owens, whose team upset top-seed Eastview 3-2 in overtime in the section semifinals last Monday. “We’ve been doubted all year. Maybe no one believed in us. But you’ve got a group of 20 here that just want it so badly.

“We’re always going to go out there and give you our best. We’re going to play Raider hockey.”

Owens and company find out who they will face in the Class 2A state quarterfinals Thursday at Xcel Energy Center when the tournament pairings are announced Saturday morning.

St. Thomas Academy, the No. 3 seed, finished its season 17-9-2.

This marks the second straight year Cretin-Derham Hall (17-10-1) has beaten the Cadets in the section final. And Friday’s victory means Mike Randolph — the head coach at St. Thomas Academy since 2022 and previously the longtime head coach at Duluth East — will enter next season still tied with former Rochester Mayo coach Lorne Grosso (1966-2016) for the most victories in Minnesota high school hockey history with 707.

This despite the fact his team outshot the Raiders 36-22.

“They played very well,” said Randolph, whose team beat No. 2-seeded Rosemount 3-2 in the semifinals Monday. “They stuck to their game plan and converted on their chances. Sometimes that’s the way it goes. I’m very proud of the effort our guys put forth. Some nights the puck goes in the net and some nights it doesn’t.”

Cretin-Derham Hall junior goalie Owen Nelson made sure it didn’t very often Friday, coming up with some big saves.

“Nelly’s really stepped up at the end of the year,” Raiders coach Matt Funk said. “He’s been one of the best goalies in the state. The kids trust him. He got us here and he played great again tonight.”

Cretin-Derham Hall expanded its lead to 2-0 on a goal by sophomore Nate Chorlton with 15:43 to play in the third. The Cadets cut the gap back to one when sophomore Peter Murray scored just minutes later.

St. Thomas Academy went on the game’s only power play with 7:26 remaining, but the Raiders were able to kill it off.

“That was a huge momentum swing to kill that penalty,” Nelson said. “They’d just scored one, and it was so big for our penalty killers to clear the puck out of the zone for me and continue our momentum.”

“It was our goaltender, Nelly, he couldn’t have played better,” Owens added. “And the boys were buzzing all night. That’s just how it’s going to be when you’ve got guys who want it this bad. I’m at a loss for words right now.

“I just want to celebrate with the boys.”

Now the celebration continues into next week’s state tournament. The Raiders lost to Edina in the state semifinals a year ago. But Owens said his team is setting its sights higher this time.

“We expect a championship,” he said. “We know it’s going to be tough. But we got close last year. This year, we want to go all the way.”

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Jaxon Nelson scored three times and Oliver Moore added a pair as Minnesota overcame an early deficit and got its power play clicking, guaranteeing a home playoff series vs. Penn State next week.

As well as his team had been playing, barreling headlong toward the Big Ten playoffs, with a return trip to the NCAA tournament all but booked, Gophers coach Bob Motzko admitted that he wanted to see something from his team’s power play with rival Michigan coming to visit.

Mission accomplished.

Minnesota scored a trio of power-play goals in the second period on Friday, busting open what had been a close game on the way to a 6-2 win over the Wolverines, to clinch third place in the Big Ten standings.

Jaxon Nelson had a hat trick and Oliver Moore added a pair of goals for the Gophers (20-8-5 overall, 13-6-4 Big Ten), while Bryce Brodzinski chipped in with three assists.

The Minnesota win sets up two first-round Big Ten playoff series next weekend, with Penn State facing the Gophers and Notre Dame visiting Michigan, which will finish fourth.

Rutger McGroarty scored first for Michigan (17-13-3, 10-11-2), which also got a goal from Garrett Schifsky for a 2-2 tie after one period, but things went south after that. Wolverines starting goalie Jake Barczeski, the reigning player of the week in the Big Ten, had 13 saves in the first 40 minutes but was lifted in favor of Noah West for the final frame.

The game was a showcase of Nelson’s 6-foot-4 frame as well as his skill, as he was punishing around the net, and he turned in his first multi-goal game of the season.

Justen Close finished with 19 saves for Minnesota, which had gone 0 for 9 on the power play in the month of February. West, playing in just his second conference game for Michigan, finished with 10 saves in the third period.

Briefly

Minnesota was without forward Connor Kurth, who was scratched from the lineup with an undisclosed injury. Earlier in the week in a radio interview, Motzko had mentioned that a player had suffered a cut in practice, but did not disclose which player had been injured.

The Gophers honored a key member of their 2002 NCAA title team during the first intermission. Matt Koalska, a St. Paul native, scored the game-tying goal late in the third period of their national title game meeting with Maine, which the Gophers eventually won on an overtime power play. Koalska signed autographs on the concourse before the game.

The series concludes with a 7:30 p.m. CT start on Saturday.

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